“Why, that’s good of you,” said Amos. “I guess the boys at the jail would like a little gooseberry sauce.”
She nodded and turned round; the words came over her shoulder: “Say, sir, I expect you wouldn’t give them jam? It’s a great deal better than sauce, and—I don’t mind letting you have the extra sugar.” Amos was more bewildered than he showed, but he thanked her, and did, in fact, come that afternoon with a buggy. The first object to greet him was the large white head and the large black jaws of the Colonel, chained to a post. Amos, who is the friend of all dogs, and sometimes has an uninvited following of stray curs, gave the snarling figure-head a nod and a careless greeting: “All right, young feller. Don’t disturb yourself. I’m here, all proper and legal. How are you?” The redoubtable Colonel began to wag his tail; and as Amos came up to him he actually fawned on him with manifestations of pleasure.
“I guess he’s safe to unloose, ma’am,” said Amos.
Old Twentypercent was looking on with a strange expression. “He likes you, sir; I never saw him like a stranger before.”
“Well, most dogs like me,” said Amos. “I guess they understand I like them.”
“I reckon you’re a good man,” said Old Twentypercent, solemnly. From this auspicious beginning the acquaintance slowly but steadily waxed into a queer kind of semi-friendship. Amos always bowed to the old woman when he met her on the street. She sent the prisoners in the jail fruit every Sunday during the season; and Amos, not to be churlish, returned the courtesy with a flowering plant, now and then, in winter. But he never carried his gifts himself, esteeming that such conduct would be an intrusion on a lady who preferred a retired life. Esquire Clark, however, was of a social turn. He visited the jail often. The first time he came Amos sent him back. The messenger, Mrs. Raker, was received at the door, thanked warmly, sent away loaded with fruit and flowers, but not asked over the threshold, which made Amos the surer that he was right in not going himself. Nevertheless, he did go to see Miss Clark, but hardly on his own errand. A carpenter in the town, a good sort of thriftless though industrious creature, came to Amos to borrow some money. He explained that he needed it to pay interest on a debt, and that his tools were pledged for security. The interest, he mourned, was high, and the debt of long standing. The creditor was Old Twentypercent.
“It’s a shame I ’ain’t paid it off before, and that’s a fact,” he concluded; “but a feller with nine children can’t pay nothing—not even the debt of nature—for he’s ’fraid to die and leave them. And the blamed thing’s been a-runnin’ and a-runnin’, like a ringworm, and a-eatin’ me up. Though my wife she says we’ve more’n paid her up in interest.” Amos had an old kindness for the man, and after a visit to his wife—he holding the youngest two of the nine (twins) on his knees and keeping the peace with candy—he told the pair he would ask Miss Clark to allow a third extension, on the payment of the interest.
“Well, but I don’t know’s he’s even got that,” said the wife, anxiously. “We’d a lot of expenses; I don’t s’pose we’d orter had the twins’ photographs taken this month, but they was so delicate I was ’fraid we wouldn’t raise ’em; and Mamie really couldn’t go to school without new shoes. Children’s a blessing, I s’pose, but it’s a blessing poor folks had got to pay for in advance!”
“So!” says Amos. “Well, we’ll have to see to that much, I guess. I’ll go this night.” He betook himself to his errand in a frame of mind only half distasteful. The other half was curious. His visit fell on a summer night, a Sunday night, when the air was soft and still and sweet with the tiny hum of insects and the smell of drying grass and the mellow resonance of the church-bells. Amos climbed the clay stairs. The white porcupine blazed above the bluffs. It gave light enough to see the color of the grass and flowers; yet not a real color, only the ghost of scarlet and green and white, and only a ghost of the violet sky, while all about the devouring shadows sank form and color alike in their olive blacks. The stars were out in the sky and the south wind in the trees. Amos stepped across the lawn—he was a light walker although a heavy-weight—and stopped before the front door, which had long windows on either side. He had his arm outstretched to knock; but he did not knock, he stood and watched the green holland shade that screened the window rise gradually. He could see the room, a large room, uncarpeted, whereby the steps of the inmate echoed on the boards. He could see a writing-desk, a table, and four or five chairs. These chairs were entirely different from anything else in the room; they were of pretty shape and extremely comfortable. Immediately the curtain descended at a run, and the old woman’s voice called, “You’re a bad cat; don’t you do that again!” The voice went on, as if to some one present: “Did you ever see such a trying beast? Why, he’s almost human! Now, you watch; the minute I turn away from that window, that cat will pull up the shade.” It appeared that she was right, for the curtain instantly rolled up again. “No, honey,” said Miss Clark, “you mustn’t encourage the kitty to be naughty. ’Squire, if I let that curtain stay a minute, will you behave!” A dog’s growl emphasized this gentle reproof. “You see the Colonel disapproves. Don’t pull the dog’s tail, honey. Oh, mercy! ’Squire!” Amos heard a crash, and in an instant a flame shot up in a cone; and he, with one blow dislodging the screen from the open window, plunged into the smoke. The cat had tipped over the lamp, and the table was in a blaze. Amos’s quick eye caught sight of the box which served Esquire for a bed. He huddled feather pillow and rug on the floor to invert the box over the blaze. The fire was out in a moment, and Margaret had brought another lamp from the kitchen. Then Amos had leisure to look about him. There was no one in the room. Yet that was not the most pungent matter for thought. Old Margaret, whom he had considered one of the plainest women in the world, as devoid of taste as of beauty, was standing before him in a black silk gown. A fine black silk, he pronounced it. She had soft lace about her withered throat, and a cap with pink ribbons on her gray hair, which looked silvery soft. Her skin, too, seemed fairer and finer: and there were rings that flashed and glowed on her thin fingers. It was not Old Twentypercent; it was a stately little gentlewoman that stood before him. “How did you happen to come, sir?”—she spoke with coldness.
“I came on an errand, and I was just at the door when the curtain flew up and the cat jumped across the table.”